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Mandolin

Epiphone Mandobird

Name: Epiphone Mandobird
Brand: Epiphone

Epiphone · Mandobird

Price: 346 EUR – 728 EUR

Price history

Cheapest seen Most expensive seen

Availability: 4/10 (Common)

An electric mandolin shaped like a miniature reverse Firebird: solid nato body, bolt-on mahogany neck, and a single Firebird-style pickup, aimed at guitarists exploring mandolin tones as much as mandolin players going electric.

Where available? Go to the best price – 362 EUR About this instrument

About the Epiphone Mandobird

The Mandobird takes Epiphone's reverse-Firebird body outline and scales it down to mandolin size - a solid nato body rather than the carved spruce top of an acoustic mandolin, since there's no need for the top to vibrate when a magnetic pickup does the work. The bolt-on mahogany neck (rather than the set or carved necks typical of acoustic mandolins) carries a laurel fingerboard with 21 frets at a 12-inch radius and a 13.78-inch scale, wider-spaced than many electric mandolins for easier chord shapes.

Electronics are a single Epiphone Firebird-style pickup with master volume and tone controls, feeding a standard guitar amp rather than requiring acoustic amplification. The bridge is a top-mounted, string-through-body design for sustain, with four Grover Mini Rotomatic tuners. Being solid-body and magnetically pickup-driven, the Mandobird has none of an acoustic mandolin's inherent feedback problems at stage volume.

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eBay 1 Reverb 4

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Reverb 362 EUR Best price View details
Reverb 374 EUR View details
eBay 454 EUR View details
Reverb 484 EUR View details
Reverb 728 EUR View details

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Source: https://reverb.com/item/100657069-epiphone-mandobird-viii-vs-vintage-sunburst-epiphone-side-string-mandolin-sj05050066-08-18

Sound character of the Epiphone Mandobird

A solid nato body and single magnetic pickup mean the sound comes almost entirely from string vibration and electronics rather than a resonating top, giving a thicker, more sustained, electric-guitar-like voice than any acoustic mandolin - none of the papery chop-tone or feedback-proneness a carved-top mandolin has at stage volume. The string-through-body bridge adds sustain on top of that.

Full-bodied Resonant Modern/Hi-Fi

Technical data for the Epiphone Mandobird

Body	Solid nato, reverse Firebird shape
Neck	Bolt-on mahogany
Fretboard	Laurel, 12" radius
Frets	21
Scale length	13.78"
Pickup	Epiphone Firebird-style (single)
Tuners	Grover Mini Rotomatic

Price history for the Epiphone Mandobird

Cheapest seen: 346 EUR · Most expensive seen: 728 EUR

Cheapest seen Most expensive seen

The history of the Epiphone Mandobird

Electric mandolins trace back to Western swing bands of the 1940s and 50s, who needed the instrument to cut through amplified ensembles; Epiphone's Mandobird revives that concept in a Firebird body shape recognizable to rock guitarists, positioning it as much as a novelty/alternate-tuning instrument for guitarists as a genuine bluegrass-adjacent electric mandolin.